Video chat used to be a novelty activity on the computer, but now more common than ever. Distant friends and family use video chat to communicate closely, and businesses take advantage of it for teleconferencing, perhaps connecting multiple branches around the world.
Skype has been the dominant service for years, but in the last few years, Apple’s FaceTime, Google’s Hangouts, Facebook and even many apps have popped up making the video chat market more popular (and perhaps more saturated) than ever before. . Snapchat.
However, as video chat becomes more popular, users need to be aware that there is a right way as well as a wrong way to video chat. Sure, some of your friends you’re with FaceTime may not care if your microphone sounds terrible or that they can barely see you through that window, but most of the time they find it annoying.
It’s not just about looking or sounding professional when video chatting to impress, it’s just about making the experience better for the user you’re chatting with. Here are some tips to follow to make sure your next FaceTime video chat goes smoothly for both of you.
Have Good Lighting
This is a very basic principle in all types of photography and videography, and it applies twice to video chatting: Make sure you have good lighting.
What exactly does this mean? All you have to do is make sure you have a light source facing you and try not to have any light source behind you. This will create a silhouette and the people you’re chatting with won’t be able to see you – they’ll just be blinded by the bright window you’re sitting in front of.
Luckily, getting good lighting during video chat isn’t too difficult, as all you have to do is pick up your laptop and sit by a window with the light directly facing you – no need to go out and buy expensive lightweight kits.
Place Your Webcam At Eye Height
This tip isn’t a big deal, but it will make you look your best while video chatting with a friend, family member, or even a coworker if you’re working remotely. Place your webcam at eye level so that when you look straight ahead, you will see your webcam facing immediately behind you.
However, you also don’t want to have too much free space above your head, so if necessary, tilt the webcam down a bit so that there is only a small gap between the top of your head and the top of the screen. This will make you look the most presentable and will not make people stare at your nose.
And for the sake of all that is sacred, leave some breathing space between your face and your webcam; we don’t want to see the fine details of his face when it takes up the whole window.
Use Headphones or Headphones
If there’s only one tip to take away from this, it’s that you should always wear headphones or earplugs. This is not just a tip, it’s practically an unwritten rule for video chatting. No one likes to hear feedback, so you should at least wear a pair of headphones so that sound from other people speaking isn’t routed from your microphone back to their speakers.
If you can, buy a good headset with a boom mic. The problem with built-in microphones on laptops and other devices is that their range and sensitivity are set really high so that they can pick up sounds from a few meters away. That’s great, but it also means it easily picks up on background noise like dogs barking or a hair dryer gushing in the distance.
Boom headsets can be much less sensitive because you’re speaking directly. This means that headphones can block out annoying noises that occur near video chat, but the default built-in microphone in a laptop can easily pick up such noise. The dedicated microphone in most headphones will suppress any background noise and the quality will be much better overall.
Wire Cutter Recommends Microsoft’s LifeChat LX-6000 USB headset and after several weeks of use we agree with them. It’s comfortable to wear and has an inline control that lets you adjust the volume, answer/hang up calls, and even mute your mic with the push of a button, which brings us to our next tip…
Mute Your Microphone When Not Speaking
While a headset with a boom microphone will block out most of the background noise, obviously it won’t. all noise and sounds of barking dogs can still pass. Also, people don’t want to hear you breathe, cough or clear your throat. That’s why you should mute your microphone when you’re not speaking.
If you get a USB headset, it most likely comes with a built-in mute button, that way you don’t have to click the mute button on the software end while video chatting, as this can be a bit cumbersome. However, having a physical mute button in your hand makes muting and unmuting your microphone much easier and faster.
When it comes to using FaceTime on your iPhone or iPad, of course you can’t use a USB headset, but even the stock headphones that only come with your iPhone are good enough to replace one, and you can mute and unmute your mic with ease. from the touch screen.
Make Sure You Have a Good Connection
Video chat takes up a lot of internet bandwidth, so you should make sure you have a good connection. Often times, it is better not to video chat than to log in and provide a delayed video and audio experience to the people you are chatting with.
If you can, make sure you plug it into an ethernet connection if you’re using your laptop; A wired connection is much more reliable than a wireless connection. If you’re using a smartphone or tablet, all you can really do is make sure your WiFi or data signal is good enough by looking at the corresponding icons in the menu bar and making sure you have at least solid bars.
Turn on Do Not Disturb
No one likes to hear someone else’s phone ring in the middle of a video chat, especially if it’s a business video chat meeting. Also, depending on the volume of the ringer, it could potentially scream out of your microphone and into the speakers of the people you’re chatting with in an alarming voice.
Also, the last thing you want is distraction during a video chat, and it’s a little rude not to give your full attention to the person you’re chatting with, so it’s still in your best interest to put your phone on silent or in Do Not Disturb mode. .
Do you have any other tips for good video chat etiquette? Shout them out in the comments below.